


the ghosts' guide to haunting etiquette

by hi_hello_hey_there



Series: you don't have to say i love you (to say i love you) [5]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Gen, Luke's Love Language is Acts of Service, Washing Dishes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-19
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:40:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27093694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hi_hello_hey_there/pseuds/hi_hello_hey_there
Summary: "I did the dishes."
Relationships: Alex & Julie Molina & Luke Patterson & Reggie, Alex & Luke Patterson & Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms), Alex & Luke Patterson (Julie and The Phantoms), Alex & Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms), Luke Patterson & Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms)
Series: you don't have to say i love you (to say i love you) [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1942267
Comments: 15
Kudos: 320





	the ghosts' guide to haunting etiquette

**Author's Note:**

> Requested by: [gay-in-221b](https://gay-in-221b.tumblr.com/). Thanks for everything, Jess! You're amazing and I appreciate you! <3  
> Beta read by: Cassie! You're the best!. Check her out on tumblr at [findingsofafangirl](https://findingsofafangirl.tumblr.com/) and [academia-and-politics](https://academia-and-politics.tumblr.com/).

Luke feels bad about taking up space at the Molina house without being able to contribute. Not that he takes up much space because of the whole, you know, being dead thing, but still. Julie and her family have been kind enough to let the boys essentially live in the studio for free and let them wash their clothes every once in a while when they get particularly bad.

He’d brought it up with Ray once, a day after he’d seen his parents and couldn’t stand to be alone and didn’t want to bother Julie at school. Ray had only said that bringing his daughter back from the dark place she’d gotten to was compensation enough. It was nice of him to say and Luke would be lying if he said he didn’t feel a little choked up, but that doesn’t stop the feeling of being a burden from cropping up when he notices Ray struggling to juggle work, school, and housework or when Carlos and Julie have to stop doing homework to take care of a chore.

One night after dinner, the Molinas had gone their separate ways to do their own work, leaving the dishes from that evening in the sink for later, Luke gets an idea. “Boys,” he says, poofing out of his chair at the table into the kitchen. He points at the discarded plates in the sink. “We’re gonna help out.”

Alex poofs over next to him and looks down at the mess. “That seems like a… dangerous idea. These dishes are very fragile and we are very not solid.”

Luke smacks a hand down on his shoulder with a grin on his face. “Then we practice. The Molinas have opened their home to us so we should start pulling our weight. You’re with me, right Reg?”

Reggie joins them, discarding his leather jacket over the back of the closest chair. “Yeah. Plus, it’s a good way to test our limits while also being helpful!”

“If something gets broken, I will not take a single iota of blame,” Alex says, but he rolls up the sleeves of his flannel all the same and reaches into the sink gently. He passes through the plate on his first try, so he stops to collect himself before trying again, more successfully this time. Then he tries for the sponge resting in a little ceramic dish by the faucet. He picks it up and starts to wipe at the plate. He chuckles nervously but his face is covered in excitement. “Um, cool. Luke?”

Luke steps up beside him and delicately grabs hold of the plate to run it under the water, making sure all the suds are off before passing it off to Reggie with a towel to dry. And so they fall into a rhythm: Alex washes, Luke rinses, Reggie dries. Wash, rinse, dry, repeat. Alex, Luke, then Reggie until they get the hang of it.

They really do try to be quiet, but they’re all so shocked and, honestly, too enthusiastic about something they hated doing while alive, that it’s hard to stop the humming and singing they start up. Each of them introduces the others to a song they’d learned about from Carlos. Alex picks something by a bubbly girl group from the early 2000s, while Reggie is completely enamored with a rapper-slash-country singer called Lil Nas X. Luke, in true Luke fashion, picks a song he’d heard from a band called All Time Low that has the same rock-pop-punk sound Sunset Curve had strived for.

Sooner than they expected, they’d finished all the dinner plates, silverware, glasses, and serving platters that had been used that night, all of them immaculate and put away in their rightful spots. It  _ is  _ an accident, after that, when Alex sprays Luke with water from the draining sink. Luke is especially startled because not only does he get sprayed with water but  _ it doesn’t go through him _ , meaning he is soaked and Alex is dead meat. Metaphorically speaking. “Oh, my god. I am so sorry! I didn’t mean-”

Luke is in high spirits -pun not intended- so a devious smile crosses his face. “You are so gonna get it, drummer boy.” He grabs the detachable spray head and points it at Alex, laughing maniacally the whole time.

“Dude! It was an accident! Have mercy!” Alex tries and fails to cover himself by hiding behind the island.

“Never!”

And when Reggie screams, “Water fight!” it really is over. The kitchen is a wet, soapy mess in no time at all. Alex leaves his post to try and grab at the sponge but Reggie already has his hands on it and is leaving a bubbly beard on Alex’s chin. Luke turns the hose on Reggie hitting him square in the face and leaving him wide open for Alex to ambush him with the now-damp drying rag and snapping it across his bicep.

None of them see Julie until Luke has jumped on Alex’s back and Reggie has attached himself to Alex’s leg. Her arms are crossed, but her tone playful when she clears her throat for their attention. “What’s going on, guys?”

A very pregnant pause, all of them feeling caught red handed, settles over the room. **“I did the dishes,”** Luke says, proud of himself.

“Well, we did the dishes,” Reggie automatically corrects him, hoisting himself off the ground and helping Luke slide off of Alex.

Julie looks around the practically flooded kitchen and approaches them with the precursor to silent fury written all over her face. She runs her fingers through Luke’s hair, laden with soap suds, and scoops a dollop of bubbles off the end of Reggie’s nose. She shakes her head affectionately at them, the air of anger around her dissipating to one of fond exasperation. “Don’t move. I’ll get some towels.”

She disappears again and the boys let out a collective breath they didn’t know they were holding. “That was scary,” Alex says, a little dumbfoundedly.

“I can’t believe she didn’t kick us out.” Reggie also sounds a little flabbergasted, not to mention there’s a lot to unpack from his statement that nobody had the energy to do right now.

“She wouldn’t,” Luke says teasingly. “She’s too attached to us.” He smiles giddily at the thought. Sure, he was just being facetious, but he really means it. They are all too entangled to get rid of each other now; it’s way past too late for that.

And Luke couldn’t be happier because he loves his new home and the new members of his family.

**Author's Note:**

> Back to our regularly scheduled programming! This one is mostly the brain child of mine and Jess's back and forth headcanon-ing, so you can thank her as well. As always, requests are open from [this list](https://p0ck3tf0x.tumblr.com/post/98502010026/one-hundred-ways-to-say-i-love-you). All prompts are available except 10, 12, 19, 31, 33, 37, 38, 39, 41, 44, 53, 63, 65, 67, 82, 83, 86, 91, 92, 98, and 99. You can drop a comment here or send a message to either of my tumblr accounts.
> 
> main: [hi-hello-hey-there](https://hi-hello-hey-there.tumblr.com/)  
> side: [toziers-token](https://toziers-token.tumblr.com/)
> 
> love, blue

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] the ghosts' guide to haunting etiquette](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27703289) by [steepedinwords](https://archiveofourown.org/users/steepedinwords/pseuds/steepedinwords)




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